Shining a light on schools: Rethinking art in education

Textbook is an ongoing art project that considers alternative perspectives on school. It began with a collaboration in 2021 between 10 teachers, Heart of Glass and artist and educator, Sarah Bailey. 

Planning took place in the messy middle of Covid restrictions. In the media, schools were spoken about in alarmingly impersonal terms such as ‘vectors for infection’ and ‘lost learning’. We seemed to forget that austerity had already been present in our classrooms. Occasionally the voice of a teacher broke through to talk about impact. 

Once we’d lost energy for their rainbows, we didn’t hear much from children. It seemed outlandish we might talk about the humans who inhabit educational spaces or – even more ridiculous – their hearts and imaginations. 

In socially engaged work we have to meet the people, their place and the context. By considering these elements as essential, we endeavour to reimagine stories and forms that speak in a language that is authentic to the world we are revealing.

Active listening

Heart of Glass has a history of work that seeks to listen actively to children. In 2017, Mark Storor conjured an Army of Beauty; young people from across St Helens marched to the town hall to deliver a statement, leading to a conversation about a Children’s Charter. Written by high school pupil, Ben, the declaration included the line: “I am the fire speaking my mind and sticking up for other people’s rights. Also, I am the swirls of democracy.” 

In process too in 2021 was The Book of St Helens, a guidebook written by 146 primary school children in collaboration with artists, Andy Field and Beckie Darlington, inviting adults and decision makers in the town to consider St Helens through their perspective. 

Meanwhile through The Talk (2020-2021), artist and storyteller Marjorie H Morgan, focuses on the intersection of race, parenting and growing up, which led to a carefully and collaboratively developed resource for those working with children and young people. It supports the vital work needed to develop knowledge and understanding of racial literacy in our schools. In practice like this we see the power of a teacher’s presence in our most pressing societal questions.

Before you’re a teacher, you’re a person

All this work being done, for Textbook we tuned our listening into the possibilities of a teacher’s imagination. We identified the diverse way-markers we had from our own memories of education, and moved on to consider searching contemporary questions such as: “What is a school (for)?”; “What’s the role of the child?”; and “What relationship do we want between school and community?” 

We didn’t all agree, but this wasn’t about finding a definitive answer. Danielle, from Cygnus Academies Trust, reflected that there hadn’t been any space to zoom out and consider their ‘why’ together as professionals in recent years, no opportunity to consider the principles. 

Together we made a space that wasn’t about operation, but about being together and considering what we knew both from expertise, but maybe also just in the marrow of our bones. Before you’re a teacher, you’re a person. 

Art work inspired by The Talk Learning Resource and exhibited as part of Black History Month 2023. Image: Courtesy of St Margaret's CE Primary School, Whalley Range

Understanding and empathy

The questions we encountered through Textbook joined those raised through other work at Heart of Glass. Mark Storor helps us to wonder about the space for young people in the civic world. In Andy Field and Beckie Darlington’s projects such as Lookout (2022), we reflect on children’s experiences and their imagined futures. And through Fox Irving’s Creative Class project, young people are invited to create new pathways to becoming an artist in an increasingly unequal and precarious world.

In collaborative practice, we arrive in different roles with a shared interest and a stated aim, but we have different relationships to the process. For the teachers in Textbook, some of us were galvanised by a return to core principles and a hunger to continue our own learning. 

From the education perspective, Danielle reflects that “it's been one of the most impactful projects and creative activities I've been involved with in my whole career. It's something I've absolutely fallen in love with… It was a profound experience from the beginning.” 

For producers, the work continues to shape practice and programme. For the artist, it revealed another layer of questions and poetry to be crafted into future work. The children talked about understanding and empathy and the power of adults listening to their stories. 

Scarlett, a collaborator on The Book of St Helens says: "I remember talking about what we think we could do to St Helens to make it a better place and just see it from our point of view. I think that I've understood other people's perspectives more. I've really understood what other people think of things and included that in my perspective."

New forms of storytelling

The work continues to grow. Textbook is shifting from a pamphlet into an assemblies format. And Sarah is developing alternative gatherings through combined arts storytelling with children and families in primary schools and with educators. 

For educators, we share Textbook through collaborative reading. Danielle reflects that the power of this is in the importance of a moment together. “We developed a community yesterday, but it’s organic and will change and evolve. It’s creating a moment to plant a seed and then allowing it to grow. We have to remember to do that – even I get caught up in the machinery of education sometimes.” 

In these assemblies, we meet with imagery from the pages of Textbook. In the reflections there we catch new glimmers of ourselves as learners. We uncover the important questions for us now, and physically light them up. Lantern in hand, teachers have asked questions like: “How do we find new ways to be together?”; “How do we make space for children’s expression and play?”; and “How do we centre freedom?” 

Questions like these are unanswerable if we rely on Q&A and soundbites. These are questions for poetry, not prose. They are ripe for conversation, creation and shared dreaming. We want to keep asking them because they contain the learning that we all long for; for vibrant possibilities and overlooked joys that we may not have seen together yet. 

Sarah Bailey is an artist, educator and consultant. 
Kate Houlton is Children and Young People's Producer at Heart of Glass. 
Danielle Lewis-Egonu is Chief Executive Officer of Cygnus Academies Trust. 
 heartofglass.org.uk/ | sarahbailey.net/ | cygnusacademiestrust.org.uk/
@TheHeartofGlass 
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This article, sponsored and contributed by Heart of Glass is part of a series exploring how, by building deeper relationships with communities, the arts can create fairer futures and act as a positive force for change.